IT’S GOOD TO BE THE SULTAN: Turkey’s Erdogan Got a Half-Billion Dollar Gift From Qatar.

Erdogan confirmed receipt of the gift as he hit back at critics who’d been questioning whether it was actually paid for with taxpayer money. Turkey had showed interest in purchasing the aircraft when it was up for sale for around $500 million, Erdogan told reporters over the weekend, according to Hurriyet newspaper. But when Qatar’s ruler found out, he donated it to the Turkish presidency free of charge, Erdogan said.

Turkey’s political, military and economic relations with Qatar have improved dramatically as Ankara sided with the gas-rich Gulf state in its tussle with a regional alliance led by Saudi Arabia. Last month, Qatar’s ruler met Erdogan in Ankara and promised to invest $15 billion in the country to try and pull Turkey back from the brink of a financial crisis.

There’s much more ruin left in Erdogan’s economy than that.

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: Scholar: ‘Kinky people’ should be a protected class.

JUSTICE: My Rape Doesn’t Justify Punishing People Without Due Process.

This is a powerful piece, impossible to excerpt.

Just read the whole thing.

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LIZ SHELD’S MORNING BRIEF: Kava-Nope strategy: delay, delay, delay. Oh, and pay protesters. “Unlike in notorious #MeToo cases like those of Larry Nassar and Harvey Weinstein, this accusation has not launched more accusations. The most prominent men accused of sexual assault in the #MeToo era have had a long history of abusing women — many women. The allegations are decades old, well beyond the statute of limitations. This fact means that Ford is essentially a character witness against Kavanaugh. That’s why it matters that approximately 200 women have testified to the judge’s high moral character (a story of mine that Rush Limbaugh talked about yesterday). It also matters that two of Kavanaugh’s former girlfriends — who both knew him in high school — called him ‘a perfect gentleman’.”

Tyler O’Neil is filling in for Liz today with some very good stuff.

YEP:

GOVERNING FROM THE MIDDLE: Maryland’s Larry Hogan.

I ran for office saying everybody was going to be included, it was going to be one Maryland. We weren’t just gonna focus on just one area, we’ve invested more money in Baltimore City, and Prince George’s, and Montgomery County than ever before. But they had already been getting a lot of attention.

The ones that had not are where we’ve been focused. They have issues like heroin. When I was running for governor, going to Cumberland and Hagerstown were the most shocking things to me. Because you know, I went to every little community, I went to every small town everywhere, I went to all 24 counties and jurisdictions, probably almost every little town. I thought, what is going on here?

When we were running the first time we had no money in our campaign. It was this whole grassroots effort and I just said, “I’m going to talk to everybody, everywhere.” Every place I went I would sit down with local community leaders, maybe some of the elected officials in the town, the local business leaders, and I would sit them down in a restaurant or town hall or something. I would say, “what are the serious problems that are facing your community?” And I thought I would hear, you know education, or transportation, or we need help with our economy and jobs, but what I heard in Cumberland and I heard in Hagerstown, and then I started to hear everywhere was heroin.

Read the whole thing. It’s from Salena Zito.

CONFIRM HIM AND MOVE ON. THIS IS A JOKE. Byron York: Some GOP positions hardening after Ford refusal to take part in Monday hearing.

LAYERS OF EDITORS AND FACT-CHECKERS: The New York Times Thinks Angela Bassett is Omarosa. “Tuesday’s print edition of The New York Times incorrectly identifies a picture of actress Angela Bassett—the Golden Globe winner and Academy Award nominee who has played Tina Turner and Betty Shabazz—as Omarosa Manigault Newman, a former Trump employee who has played herself on both network television and in real life.”

Pretty sure that’s racism when a right-leaning publication does it.

IT’S LIKE THIS WHOLE THING IS JUST AN EFFORT TO STALL PAST THE MIDTERMS: Kavanaugh accuser says FBI should investigate before she testifies.

NOW IT’S LITTLE MORE THAN A VIRTUE-SIGNALING HASHTAG: A French Veteran of la Résistance During WW II: “Use the word Resistance only if, by misfortune, the duty to Resist were again to arise for real.”

PRIVACY: 10 years later, Google still has the creepy ability to remotely control a phone.

Ten years is a long time. Nearly long enough to forget that Google — and for that matter, Apple — have the ability to control some parts of your phone over the internet. And maybe quietly change things without your permission.

But Google made a very public mistake last week, and it’s raising the specter of doubt once again.

Last week, Android users began reporting that their phones’ Battery Saver feature had mysteriously turned on, all by itself, regardless of whether their batteries needed saving or not. Fully-charged devices started throttling themselves, halting background updates, seemingly because of a bug in the Android P update, as Android Police reported.

Only it wasn’t a bug. According to one of the company’s official Reddit accounts, Google itself was responsible. The company was conducting “an internal experiment to test battery saving features that was mistakenly rolled out to more users than intended,” according to the statement.

Is there anything Google does that isn’t creepy?

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: Feds Spend $1,009,762 Training ‘Social Justice’ Math Teachers.

THE DEEP STATE STRIKES BACK: FBI, DOJ Plan Redactions Despite Trump’s Document Order.

The Justice Department, FBI and Office of the Director of National Intelligence are going through a methodical review and can’t offer a timeline for finishing, said the people, who weren’t authorized to speak publicly about the sensitive matter.

The White House issued a statement on Monday listing material that Trump wants declassified immediately, echoing demands of Republican lawmakers who share his contention that the continuing investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election was tainted by anti-Trump bias well before Robert Mueller was named special counsel to run it.

Among Trump’s demands was the full public release of all text messages concerning the Russia probe by Justice Department official Bruce Ohr and by several former officials, including two who were fired — former FBI Director James Comey and his deputy, Andrew McCabe. One person described the order to release text messages as unprecedented, and another said additional talks will probably be held with the White House over the matter.

What are they trying to hide and why are they trying to hide it?

NICHOLAS BALLASY: GOP Congressman Says Only Way to Pass DACA Fix Is ‘Jamming This on People.’ “Hurd notes difficulty bringing Republican colleagues on board immigration bill because “they are afraid of ultimately being pegged as you support amnesty’.”

WORST PUTIN PUPPET EVER: ‘Fort Trump’: US considers permanent base in Poland.

ICYMI: DIANNE FEINSTEIN ON KAVANAUGH ACCUSATION: ‘I CAN’T SAY EVERYTHING IS TRUTHFUL.’

Senator Dianne Feinstein of California conceded Tuesday that she can’t attest to the veracity of Christine Blasey Ford’s allegation that Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh sexually assaulted her when they were in high school.

“[Ford] is a woman that has been, I think, profoundly impacted. On this . . . I can’t say that everything is truthful. I don’t know,” Feinstein told reporters on Capitol Hill when asked if she believed the allegation.

As one Twitter user noted, “And there we go. Why Feinstein sat on it for months. She didn’t buy it either. But she needed a last-minute Hail Mary so this is what she went for.”

Related: Andrew McCarthy on Democrats, Kavanaugh, and ‘The End of Civilization.’

THE IMPORTANT MYSTERIES OF THE UNIVERSE: Socks – Lost and Wandering.

IF WE LET THEM CONTINUE BUILDING THEIR KAFKA TRAPS, THE WHOLE COUNTRY WILL BE CAUGHT:  The Kavanaugh accusation: “In war, truth is the first casualty”.

THE MASKS ARE INDEED COMING OFF: ‘Twitter is run by SJWs!’ said Jack Dorsey.

THIS IS WHY JUDICIAL PROTECTIONS WERE BUILT INTO OUR SYSTEM:  Memory and witnesses/victims. Even with the best intentions in the world, errors happen, much less when half of the country has gone deranged and uses unprovable (or disprovable) accusations as a weapon of terror.
Also, do they realize the tumbrils will eventually also come for them?

SERIOUSLY, HAS EVERYONE GONE MAD? IF I SAY THAT FLAKE FELT ME UP IN FIRST GRADE, AT AN UNDISCLOSED LOCATION, WILL HE THINK I NEED TO BE HEARD? WHAT ARE THESE PEOPLE DRINKING?  Breaking: Kavanaugh’s Accuser Says She Won’t Testify Until The FBI, Which Has Already Declined to Investigate Her Non-Federal-Jurisdiction 37 Year Old Allegations, Completes Its Investigation, Sometime After a Democrat is President.  What happened to innocent till proven guilty or the right to confront one’s accusers? Can’t the democrats wait to go the full Stalin?

RUN, CHICKEN COOPER, RUN.  BUT NOT FOR PRESIDENT. OR AS A FRIEND FROM ARKANSAS TOLD US IN 1993 “I NEVER MEANT FOR THAT B*STARD TO BE INFLICTED ON THE REST OF THE NATION”:  Hickenlooper Takes Major Step toward Presidential Run.

MAKING HOMESCHOOLING THE ONLY OPTION:  Because mark my words, duckies, private schools also hire leftist education majors, and use the “approved” curriculum.  Feds Spend $1,009,762 Training ‘Social Justice’ Math Teachers.